Labaran Maku’s penance at National Assembly

It gladdens the heart to learn that after his boisterous dismissal of a resolution by the Senate on the threat by the Lamido Sanusi-led Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to release N5000 note into circulation next year as the personal opinion of members of the upper legislative chamber, the Minister of Information, Mr Labaran Maku realised his error and turned round to tender an unreserved apology to the lawmakers on Tuesday. In the heat of the public outrage against the proposed denomination, the Senate had lent its voice to the widespread belief that the new denomination would do more harm to the economy than good and asked the President Goodluck Jonathan to prevail on Sanusi, the CBN Governor, not to proceed further with the unpopular plan. But in a swift reaction to the Senate’s unanimous resolution, Maku waved it off as a mere advice Jonathan was not under any obligation to heed.

As would be expected, Maku’s utterance jolted the lawmakers to the marrow, and they wasted no time in telling him that coming from an unelected public office holder, his comment was at best a gross act of impudence. “I don’t think we need the Minister of Information or any other minister to tell us that our resolutions are not binding; just as we don’t need to remind him that he was not elected,” the Deputy Senate President, Senator Ike Ekweremadu, declared. On his part, the Senate President, Senator David Mark, elected to educate Maku on the statutory workings of the upper chamber. He said: “We know that our resolutions are not binding, but the positions we take in this Senate, especially regarding the resolutions, are all well thought out. They are borne out of patriotism, well researched and they are an amalgamation of the views of very responsible Nigerian. And to that extent, it is very persuasive, and any person who is ignoring the resolutions of this Senate is doing so at the expense of good governance, and we cannot encourage such a thing.”

The astute politician that he is, Maku needed no one to tell him that an ominous cloud was gathering as the senators took turns to pour their verbal venoms. And that became more apparent when he received a summons from the Senate to appear before its Committee on Information and Media. But before the chamber could wield the big stick, Maku ate the humble pie. In optimum sobriety, he did not only withdraw his comment, he profusely apologised to the lawmakers, vowing never to disparage them. Maku said: “I have no reason to disrespect or disparage the Senate. I made the statement when the press pressed me to make a direct statement on whether the Federal Government would stop the introduction of the N5000 note. But I could say that because I had not received any position from the President. If that was interpreted to mean that the Federal Government or myself considers the resolutions of the Senate as of no effect, I apologise.”

His apology, as well as the sober and pensive mien with which he tendered it, were evidence that he must have acted innocently, using the template of his boss, President Goodluck Jonathan, who travelled the same road in January without any serious consequence. In the heat of Federal Government’s nocturnal removal of the subsidy on fuel in January, the House of Representatives had added its voice to the calls for a reversal of the policy and passed a resolution requesting Jonathan to reverse the measure. But rather than heed the resolution of the lower chamber, the President waved it off as the lawmakers’ personal opinion. The best the lawmakers could do was to remind the President that it was the same resolution that crushed the barricade mounted by some influential Nigerians against his transition from Vice President to Acting President at a time his former boss, Alhaji Umaru Yar’Adua, had become physically and mentally incapacitated and the nation’s presidency lay in the gutter.

Jonathan, it must be said, had derived the temerity to deride the House from the inability of the National Assembly, particularly the Senate, to assert itself as an independent arm of government. Like I had a cause to state in this column a couple of weeks ago, the Senate under the leadership of Mark has acted more as a stooge and rubber stamp of the executive; a pawn on Jonathan’s chessboard, ever so willing to pander to the President’s promptings so that the boat would not be rocked. To the chagrin of concerned Nigerians, the Senate President has been proceeding on the flawed principle that a peaceful Senate is synonymous with a progressing Nigeria.

Studiously avoiding the infamous banana peel on account of which his predecessors like Chuba Okadigbo and Adolphus Wabara fell, Mark has ensured that his fellow senators get their entitlements as and when due. But he seems to have over-protected his seat by submitting the rights of the legislative arm to the executive in the search for a peaceful reign; so much so that he looked the other way when the Presidency insulted the lower chamber during the fuel subsidy crisis in January.

The result is that the Senate has been so dormant that more Nigerians would remember the highly eventful two-year tenure of Senator Ken Nnamani than the close to five years Mark has been in charge. But Maku’s utterance appears to have jolted the Senate out of its passive instincts. At the hallowed chamber of the Senate on Tuesday, he read the riot act to political office holders with a penchant for reckless utterances against the National Assembly, warning that the lawmakers would no longer hesitate to pass a resolution asking the President to remove such appointees. “Maku is a careless talker. He does not think properly before he talks. Maku cannot educate us, but we are to educate him. The President should caution him and the President must call his ministers to order. The next time a minister talks any how about the Senate, we shall pass a resolution that such a minister be removed,” he said.

A new dawn seems to beckon in the upper legislative chamber. Its utterances in the past few days, including the ultimatum it issued the Federal Government to file an appeal against the World Court judgment which ceded the disputed Bakassi Peninsula to Cameroun, seem to suggest that Mark and his fellow lawmakers have woken up to the realisation that they are there to represent the people; not to patronise the President.